i got hooked on the book the moment i started reading!!

when i first borrowed it off liumin, i thought i would take ages to finish this thick book with small wordings. it didn't look very appealing - a very 'cheena' looking book. but really, you can't just judge a book by its cover.

true enough. i got sucked into the story when i started reading the first chapter. i think this book reminded me of my jc days, when i was forced to remember modern china history events and dates and emperors and dynasties. history didn't really come to life for me then. today as i opened up this book, i wished i had read this book earlier because that would have made my jc history learning more exciting!

Empress Orchid tells the story of Tzu Hsi, China's longest-reigning female ruler and its last Empress. she was utterly compelling woman who used her beauty to become a concubine of the Emperor and her brains to become his confidante and lover. in the 1850s, when Orchid and her family make their way to Peking, the opium trade with Europe and peasant Taiping rebellions were chiseling away at the power of the Chi'ing Dynasty. Emperor Hsien Feng, a frail young man overwhelmed by the demands of state, must choose his Empress and concubines. Orchid was the daughter of an aristocratic but impoverished family. with an empty belly and chilled bones, she dreamt of an easy life within the walls of the Forbidden City. Orchid entered the Emperor's "contest," opened to all women of full Manchu blood. to her surprise, she was chosen as a low-ranking concubine.

life in the Forbidden City was hierarchical, highly structured, full of suffocating tradition and endless waiting — Orchid must wear formal dress and makeup every day, in case the Emperor should call. for months she sat in her beautiful palace waiting for the call. when she finally won the Emperor's attention, after scheming with her trusted eunuch, she became the target of thousands of other women trying just as hard to claw their way into his presence.

bribery, betrayal, even murder were the weapons used. when, in failing health, the Emperor requested Orchid's help with affairs of state, his advisers resisted her at every turn and eventually plot to have her buried alive. in 1856 Orchid gave birth to the Emperor's only son, Tung Chih, and in 1861, in the Emperor's official decree after his death, she was named Empress Dowager at the tender age of twenty-six and inherited an empire on the verge of collapse. Orchid managed power struggles at court and the defiance she encountered from the Emperor's board of regents, whose only expectation of a woman was compliance. she and her son were kidnapped and the British destroyed Peking, but Orchid was able to defeat the regents and create her own government, which ruled for forty-six years.

this has been one of the best books i have read so far! i hadn't been able to put down every time i start a chapter. and amazingly, i finished reading it in less than a week!

~gracie left a note at 11:06 pm